Friday, September 12, 2025 Going South

 

Friday, September 12, 2025 Going south   

I started to throw up and my human picked me up and dropped me on the stairs.  I flipped over, all while trying to throw up.  It wasn’t fun.

I got an early start on my walk this morning, just by myself.  I headed right to the back road we found yesterday.  I stopped at the house with all the mini pears on the ground and picked up a few.  Two horses were staring at me with those long beautiful faces… they each got a pear.  I will pick more up on the way back.

This back road is gorgeous.  A stream runs on one side, with the volcanic mountains in the back.  Cattle graze, horses roam.  I seem to be the only human activity.  I pass another house with a huge garden that they use to provide for their farm stand.  It was too early for them to be open, but it looks like they have a good supply.  The road gently curves.  I could go on for miles, but I turn around and head back.  I pick up a few more mini pears, then I see Kathy feeding a couple of other horses some of the pears.  Those horses know how to play us humans!

Back at camp, we readied Artie, and parted ways with Brian and Kathy.  They headed north, we headed west toward the city of Bend.  We pass through picture gorge, which is a narrow, rocky pass.  The road is rural not busy.  It is scenic for the first 75 miles or so.  Then we get the first whiff of smoke.  There was a sign warning about the forest fire, so it wasn’t unexpected.  Another whiff, and a bit of a haze, but it never got bad.

When we got to Bend, we went to Costco to fuel up.  I am doing a separate post on this adventure so you can understand what I go through every time we fuel up!

After Costco, we headed south on hwy 97 (after a brief fight with our GPS).  There is lots of dispersed camping in the national forests.  You can pull over anywhere basically and camp.  It can be tricky though.  You can get yourself into predicaments where you are on a road that is really rough, or where you can’t turn around.  When we were in Colorado once, we checked out a few of the areas that allowed dispersed camping.  We were very thankful that we were not towing when we explored.  We would have been in a world of hurt!  So although there is the appeal to explore, we held off till we stumbled on the Williamson River campground.  We are about 40 miles north of Klamath Falls.  The campground is on a bumpy back road, and it is first come, first served.  We have a beautiful woodsy site with a fire ring.  The temperature is mild, so this is perfect. 

By the way, as we passed some of the roads we could have boondocked on, I was thankful we didn’t turn on them…